Archive of Our Own ^beta

As much as he likes to blame it on having far too busy a schedule and far too many responsibilities, Kenma knows he’s just procrastinating. If it was anything else, he’d actually be reading his emails and answering the calls from his advisor. He would be, most definitely, doing anything other than telling Atsumu, “Go fish.”

Atsumu looks at Kenma over the top of his hand of cards, trying and failing miserably at trying to hide his smirk. He’s definitely cheating, and failing to hide that as well. He’s already the least discreet person Kenma knows, and being as sloppy as he is with his magic doesn’t help that any. But Kenma can’t call him out for it, considering he’s been changing fours to aces the last several rounds.

So they each keep their comments to themselves two rounds later when Kenma lays his hand down on the table with a sure and steady, “I win.”

“Neither of you knows how to play that game,” Kyoutani comments from where he’s looking through a rack of cheap keychains.

“You’re just bitter because you always lose,” Atsumu replies. He lays his hand of cards on the counter — there are two fives of spades — and reaches for his half-empty bottle of lemonade to take a long drink. “You know, if you’re not going to buy anything, you can just leave. There’s a sign right on the door, no loitering.”

“Shigeru’s not coming,” Kenma tells him. “Busy with that potions project.”

Kyoutani looks over with a scowl, as if he’s got any right to be shocked or offended that they both know the real reason he’s here, like, every other night. It’s a cramped, off-brand convenience store. The best thing they have to offer is discounted candy leftover from the holidays, but even that’s probably expired. So there aren’t many possibilities; either Kyoutani’s crushing on Shigeru, or he’s got a seriously weird thing for kale chips.

“The customer service here sucks,” he says, dropping a bag of sour gummies on the counter.

“Sincerest apologies,” Kenma deadpans, giving him a flat look. “We’ll do better next time. Do you want a bag for this?”

“Is this an Uno card?” Atsumu asks from behind, holding up a wild draw four. “This isn’t even the same game.”

Kenma narrows his eyes. “You were yelling too loud for me to focus.” A cheap excuse, but he’s not going to mention the stress building on his shoulders at his own doing. It’s getting bad if he can’t even pull off simple illusions, but that’s a problem for future Kenma to deal with. He turns back to Kyoutani. “Bag or what?”

“No, thanks,” Kyoutani says. “Could use a better attitude, though.”

“You’re right, yours kind of sucks.”

“Oh, fuck you.”

Kenma shrugs and takes Atsumu’s lemonade in his hand. “Shigeru comes in at nine tomorrow morning. I’m sure he’d be much more receptive to the invitation.” He brings the bottle to his mouth to hide his smile at Kyoutani’s glare. If there’s one thing to make up for working such late shifts, it’s being able to get entertainment out of their customers.

“I hope they fire you,” Kyoutani tells him, snatching up the bag of candy. Kenma already knows they probably will one day. “You both suck at your jobs.”

“Excuse you!” Atsumu interjects. “We both work very hard.”

“Whatever. Kenma was cheating.”

“Kenma!”

“Shut up, you were, too. Not my fault you’re not better at it.”

Kyoutani uses that moment to take his leave, rolling his eyes at the pair of them. As if he’s not just as bad when Shigeru’s around. Or Tooru, for that matter. When it comes down to it, Kyoutani’s just as big a nuisance as any of the rest of them. He’ll spend an hour toeing the line between bickering and flirting with Shigeru until one of them accidentally starts a fire any day of the week.

It isn’t long after he’s gone that the door swings back open, bell jingling and cutting through Atsumu’s absentminded humming as he shuffles the deck of cards. There’s a burst of heat that follows their latest customer’s arrival, despite the chilled temperature outside. Kenma’s fingers curl around the edge of the counter.

The man walks in with quick strides, black hair sticking up every which way, shirt singed and stained with ash. “I need to lift a curse.” The words tumble out of his mouth, rushed, and it takes Kenma a moment to actually process them.

After what’s probably a beat too long, Kenma tells him, “Aisle five.” He scans the rest of him, looking to see if more than just his clothes are burnt. He’s not great when it comes to first-aid, spells or no. Thankfully, the man doesn’t look injured in any way. No blood, no actual burns, just ash and charred clothing.

“Unless it’s demonic,” Atsumu chimes in.

Kenma nods in agreement. “You’re better off looking at the specialty shop across the way, if that’s the case.”

The customer offers his thanks before he speed walks towards the narrow aisles of shelving. Kenma watches him disappear behind a rack of medicinal potions, then slides his gaze to Atsumu.

Curious.

They don’t get much excitement here that they aren’t the direct cause of. Certainly nothing particularly intriguing. If anything, the other customers that come in are just loud and a little out of control.

Atsumu leans forward and ducks his head down conspiratorially. “What kind of curse d’you think it is? Bad luck? Or something more serious? Life threatening?”

Kenma’s eyes dart towards the shelves the man disappeared behind. He looked pretty charred, which isn’t a great sign regardless. Even if it is just a matter of bad luck, it’s clearly dangerous if fire is involved. At the very least, he doesn’t look hurt. Besides, this isn’t the place for anything seriously detrimental. There are higher end shops with better materials and better help, and no one’s stupid enough to come to any small shop like this if they don’t know that everything they’ll need will be available. So presuming the guy isn’t a total idiot, he isn’t as concerned.

He shrugs. “As long as it’s demonic, I don’t really care.” He’s not about to start dealing with any more of those.

Atsumu snorts. “Has Oikawa ever paid you back for that?” he asks.

“What do you think?”

As if it’s so hilarious that Kenma nearly lost a finger to Tooru’s idiotic rune mistake, without ever receiving so much as a thank you for the trouble, Atsumu tips his head back and laughs. He has the worst laugh on the face of the earth, shrill and obnoxious and he fucking snorts. “Maybe that’s what you oughta declare as your devotion. You can make your living lifting curses for chaotic dumbasses.”

“Yeah, I’m not interested in serving you for the rest of eternity.”

Atsumu only continues to laugh, and Kenma averts his gaze. He hates that everyone keeps bringing up his undeclared devotion. He’s counted on Atsumu to keep his mind off it the last few weeks, given that distracting him with frivolous things is his specialty, and yet—

Were he just a little better at manipulation, he’d be able to get out of the assignment entirely. He’d be able to get out of all of this, find some secluded little coastal town to hide out where no one could bother him until he decided whether or not he wanted to do anything with his magic at all, and work as a shopkeep for some humble family and spend his evenings sitting at the edge of a rustic old pier. Not that he’s considered it or anything.

While Atsumu isn’t providing the distraction Kenma was hoping for, the customer does. The subtle, simmering heat comes back as he approaches the counter, and a small curiosity pops up in the back of Kenma’s mind as to what, exactly, this man’s specialty is.

“Find everything you need?” Kenma asks as the man hands over the small collection of tools and ingredients.

“Hoping so.” He looks like he has more to say, or something to ask, perhaps, but nothing else comes. Kenma can feel Atsumu tipping forward in his seat, on the edge of blurting out something that likely has actual potential to get them into some sort of real trouble. Kenma gives half a wave of his hand to shove Atsumu’s lemonade back into his hands, not sparing him a glance. He isn’t about to take chances.

Kenma bags up the groceries, tells the man to have a good night, and wishes him luck as he heads out the door. The rest of the night, his mind is stuck on wondering whether he managed to lift the curse or not, all thoughts of his declaration cleared from his thoughts.

“I know attendance is optional,” Yaku says, giving Kenma a look usually reserved for Tooru, “but you have to show up sometime.”

Kenma averts his gaze, focusing on a handful of flyers on the wall advertising textbooks for sale and various club meetings. Nothing interesting, but better than Yaku’s nagging.

“Have you at least picked a field yet? You could go into just about anything, you know. It’s not like you’re limited.”

He frowns, but says nothing. Yaku knows he doesn’t like talking about it, but he’s been pushing the issue for the last two weeks now regardless, and as well as he means, it’s not what Kenma wants to hear. “And it’s not like you’re going to get rejected.” That’s the thing about Yaku, though; he continues to press and press and press an issue until he gets the response he’s looking for. There’s no off switch. It’s usually appreciated in the end, and always backed with the right intentions, but sometimes Kenma really hates it. “Nekomata actually likes you. You could probably tell him you want to dedicate your life to making magically charmed sweets in the European countryside and he’d buy you the first plane ticket to France.”

“Don’t you have a class to go to?” Kenma finally cuts in.

“You’re just mad because I’m right.”

“I will seal your mouth shut.”

Yaku rolls his eyes, but gives in for now. While he surely knows Kenma would never actually do that to him, it’s not like he hasn’t done it before to just about everyone else he knows. “At least try to work on your potions project, then. Don’t just go right home once I leave you.”

“Yeah, yeah. I’ll see you after class.”

“I mean it,” Yaku says, glancing back as he starts to turn down one of the side halls. “Quit putting it off, boy genius.”

Kenma gives a wave of his fingers and Yaku jolts forward. He shoots a glare back, and Kenma starts walking off before he can catch him smiling.

His amusement doesn’t last long, when his mind keeps circling back to his declaration. The thing about Yaku that Kenma hates the most, more than his incessant nature, is the fact that he’s always right. Kenma could fill in the form with any response he wants, as stupid and useless as it may be, and Nekomata would support it. It’s everyone else that’s an issue. It’s Kenma himself that’s an issue.

It’d be a waste to throw his skill away on something frivolous.

For a moment, Kenma considers ignoring the rest of what Yaku said and going right home, but the bigger part of him knows better, and he finds an empty lab room to make a space in. Potions themselves aren’t typically an issue, until he has to break down the chemical makeup. Too many formulas and symbols, and Kenma can’t ever crack how they all fit together. It doesn’t help that he isn’t particularly interested in it. So this project is kind of killing him, just a little bit.

(At the very least, it narrows down one option for him — whatever he tells Nekomata won’t be anything that requires hard science.)

Fifteen minutes of relatively unsuccessful work go by before the silence is interrupted. Tooru finds him, because of course he does, and helps himself to the empty seat beside him. He’s always making a place for himself, no matter whether he’s actually wanted or not.

“Skipping class, Neko-chan? Shameful, shameful.”

“It’s not required that I go,” Kenma says, not sparing him a glance, “and I’m at the top of the class anyway.”

“Brag about it, why don’t you.” Tooru pulls Kenma’s open textbook towards him, scanning the page. “Are you at least attending your other courses? You can’t actually teach yourself everything, like it or not.”

“Yes,” Kenma huffs. He pulls his textbook back, even though he isn’t even considering trying to read it anymore. “I go to all my other classes. I’m a good student.”

“Mm, I see. Just Nekomata-sensei that you’re avoiding,” Tooru nods. At Kenma’s expression, he raises both hands up in front of him. “You know I’m not judging! Your statement’s a big deal is all. I put mine off, too.”

And look where that got you. Kenma thinks it, but isn’t cruel enough to say it. It’s not like it was ultimately Tooru’s fault anyway.

“This is a forbidden topic,” he says instead. “Tell me about something actually interesting.”

A small, kind smile lifts the corners of Tooru’s lips for just a moment. He knows. He gives a thoughtful hum as he ponders what he wants to say. He’s always spinning different stories, and Kenma can’t always tell if there’s any truth to them. He’s brilliant at it, though. Tooru might have a knack for influencing others’ thoughts and emotions with his magic, but there’s never a need for it. There isn’t a soul in the world he can’t win over with his words alone.

“Kou-chan came around this morning,” he says after a minute. “His neighbor’s feuding with his familiar, so it’s chaos over there. But Kou-chan had to leave after it started raining inside his apartment — look, I took pictures, he was dripping.” He faces his phone towards Kenma, where, sure enough, there’s a whole slideshow of a sopping wet Sugawara Koushi, looking torn between laughter and defeat. “Anyway, anyway.” Tooru takes his phone back, tucks it in his pocket. “I guess this has been going on for, like, days. Kou-chan’s tried offering his help, but apparently it’s useless.”

“Suga-san’s specialty isn’t really in neutralizing or reversing situations like that,” Kenma says. A lot of the time, he makes it worse. He wonders a lot of the time if it’s intentional. It very possibly could be. When he heard about Tooru’s accidental demon summoning, he laughed for hours.

Tooru shrugs. “He still tried. I told him to keep me updated about it, I wanna know what’s going on over there.” He fiddles with empty beakers and flasks, inspecting them with long, nimble fingers. “Hey, are you working tonight? I have some things to pick up, and I need your advice on brands. I don’t trust anyone else to know what’s best.”

“We all have the same information available to us.”

“But you are the only one that’s never steered me wrong. So? Yes, no? Or are you actually giving yourself a break?”

“I can’t afford a break.” Especially, Kenma thinks, if he’s not working any closer to choosing his devotion. At this rate, corner store clerk is the only career path he’ll have available to him. “So, yeah, I’ll be there.”

“I’ll cover for you so you can take a nap for a little while,” Tooru promises, gently patting Kenma’s head.

Kenma pushes him away, but does appreciate that he means it.

“Did you— Does this say oregano? I hate to break it to you, but I cannot name one single potion that uses kitchen spices,” Tooru says, “and you suck too much at chemistry to have invented one.”

Kenma lowers his gaze to his homework assignment, sprawled across the checkout counter. He shrugs, then turns to back to the keychain display he’s been rearranging for the last ten minutes. “I just wrote whatever. I don’t really care enough anymore. Shigeru’s just gonna correct it all anyway.”

Tooru snorts and pushes the page away. “I don’t know if you’re actually a genius or if you’re just good at manipulating people to get what you want.”

“That’s you, but thanks.”

“Manipulation is an art, and it takes a lot of effort, I’ll have you know,” Tooru sniffs, even though Kenma’s already perfectly aware. He spent the entire summer of fifth grade learning the craft of it. “And I only use my abilities for good anyway.”

“Last week you tried to get Suga-san to give you his last bottle of milk tea.”

“Do or do not, there is no try, Neko-chan. I got Kou-chan to give me that milk tea.”

Kenma frowns. “That’s because Suga’s disgustingly in love with you. It’s got nothing to do with magic, he’s just whipped.”

“Love is a magic in itself! You’ll see one day.” Tooru swings an arm around Kenma’s shoulders and pulls him close to his chest. Kenma doesn’t even try to fight it. He used to put all his strength into shoving him away, but as touchy as all of Kenma’s friends are, he’s grown accustomed to it. There’s no use in trying to avoid it at this point. “One day, you’re going to fall in love with one of your infinite admirers, and you’ll know it’s the same as the feeling as lighting a flame without a match.”

“So, like, with a lighter.”

“With your fingertips,” Tooru huffs, shoving him away. “You’d better pray that the angels aren’t actually creatures of myth, because that’s what it’ll take for anyone to ever fall for you.”

“You literally just told me I have infinite admirers.”

“Did I say that? You must be mistaken, I don’t recall.” Tooru spins the rack of keychains with a casual touch, trying to act coy. It would work if it wasn’t Kenma on the other end of things. Tooru might be the king of manipulation, but Kenma’s the king of blocking his magic out. It’s as amusing to him as it is frustrating to Tooru.

“You said you were going to let me nap, but you haven’t shut up since you walked in,” Kenma says. Not that he expected otherwise. Tooru usually needs a good few minutes to get all the chatter out of his system. Plus, he knows Kenma usually likes to listen. Even if he doesn’t know half the people involved in Tooru’s stories, he likes to know what’s been going on around him.

“Fine! Fine, nap away,” Tooru says, “I’ll be quiet. I’ll text Kou-chan, he’ll keep me company— Oh. Sorry, Neko-chan, you’ve gotta wait, you have a new customer.”

Kenma turns and leans over the counter to see the door, where, sure enough, someone else is coming in. This late, on a Thursday, really, as if there isn’t anywhere better to be. He’s about to drop back into his seat when he realizes he recognizes the face.

He wonders, for a moment, if there’s been some other sort of incident, and if he hasn’t actually lifted the curse after all. There isn’t any ash or charring, or anything else particularly alarming, but that doesn’t necessarily mean the coast is clear. It also begs the question of whether his hair is just like that.

“Oh.”

Tooru swings around to look at Kenma. “‘Oh?’ What’s that mean, huh? Do you know him?” He gestures with an arm out behind himself, towards the man.

“I told you about him,” Kenma says, quiet enough that he hopes the man can’t hear. Even if he isn’t saying anything negative, he doesn’t like for anyone to know when he’s talking about them. “The one with the curse.”

“Oh!” Tooru peers over the counter towards him, observing. He’s got a scarily prying gaze. “Do you think he managed to take care of it? Maybe he didn’t, if he’s back here again.”

Kenma scrunches his nose. “If it’s seriously that bad, he should be going to a different store or getting a specialist.”

“Specialists are expensive. He looks like he’s in uni, he probably can’t afford that. Or maybe it’s a really dumb curse and he’s embarrassed,” Tooru suggests. “Maybe it’s the hair.”

Kenma snorts. It’s not funny, except, well, it is. “Don’t be mean,” he says, swatting at Tooru’s arm.

“Coming from you! Rich!”

“Where did I learn it from?”

Tooru grins, far more proud of his personality than he ought to be. “The king.”

“Get a smaller ego.”

Kenma says nothing more, can’t, because the customer is through walking the aisles, and comes up to the counter with a box of band-aids and a bundle of leather shavings. Kenma raises an eyebrow at the selection, but doesn’t comment on it. He doesn’t want to be intrusive despite his curiosity. Instead, he asks how he’s doing, the way he’s supposed to. The way he hates, because every time, Tooru gives him a mocking little grin at the customer service voice and silently mimics his expression, knowing how much he despises it. Kenma does his best to focus on the customer, a welcome distraction.

He looks sheepish, avoiding Kenma’s gaze. “Ah . . . I’m alright.” He stops, but looks like he has more he wants to say. Kenma can’t figure out if it’s Tooru’s deliberate nudge or his own unconscious one, but after a moment, the guy spills out more words. “I’m still— I mean, the curse . . . I couldn’t really . . .”

Tooru nods as if either of them are paying him any mind. “Tricky one, right? You know, Neko-chan’s good at lifting curses. He’s good at, like, everything.”

Kenma’s hands curl tight around the edge of the counter. It takes everything in him not to seal Tooru’s mouth shut. The man’s head tilts, curious.

“It’s all just basic equations,” Kenma mutters, trying to brush it off with a casual wave of his hand. “Everything can be cancelled out, you just have to know what neutralizes which pieces of a spell. Same as doing, like, math, or chemistry, or whatever.”

The guy rubs the back of his neck with an uneasy hand. “Ah, yeah. Just, I’m not really sure . . . what spell it was, exactly. I was kind of on two days with no sleep and just trying to get this project done, and something clearly got messed up, but I haven’t been able to figure out what. I think I might’ve just made things worse.” He won’t meet Kenma’s eyes, clearly embarrassed. This is why Kenma didn’t want to say anything.

“If you explain it to me, I might be able to help,” he offers, defeated. It’d go against his own moral code to just leave him stranded now that he’s spoken up about it.

“It’s . . . I sort of turned my familiar into a snake,” he admits. “Which, technically, I recognize doesn’t actually qualify as a curse, I know that. But reversing it is the same process as lifting a really petty one, and he’s been a real pain in the ass about it so it may as well be.”

Kenma snorts a laugh. He gets it. He does. “Give me a minute and I’ll write something down for you that should help. It’s not super difficult, just tedious. Easy to miss a step, so you’ve gotta be patient.”

“I can be patient. But Daishou . . .” he mutters.

Tooru bites back a laugh. Kenma knows he’s going to spend the rest of the evening talking about this guy, with an endless list of questions pondering all about who he is, what he does, what the fuck his relationship with his familiar actually is. Kenma can’t say he isn’t just as intrigued.

“Get him preoccupied,” Kenma tells him. “Or just tell ‘im that if he doesn’t cooperate he can live like that forever. His own choice, really.”

The corner of his mouth lifts into an amused smirk. “Right.”

“Just— Hang on a minute, I’ll write this out for you.”

“Right,” he repeats. “Thank you . . . Yahaba? Is that right?”

Tooru lets out a sharp laugh and immediately turns away, and Kenma glances down at the name tag pinned to his shirt. “Oh, this isn’t mine. You can call me Kenma.”

“Kenma,” he says, nodding. “Thank you. Seriously. I’ve been trying to take care of this all week. All my friends just think it’s funny or don’t know how to do it themselves, and I can’t really afford outside help. So. Thanks.”

Kenma shrugs, trying to play it off as casual as he can, even though this guy’s kind of a little bit endearing. “It’s no big deal. Nothing I haven’t done before. For him,” he says, gesturing towards Tooru, “and just about everyone else I know.”

“Still, you didn’t have to do anything for me,” he says. “So thanks.”

Kenma nods and drops his gaze to the scattering of papers on the counter. He tears a piece off an old history assignment and scrawls out the list of steps and ingredients he should need. He’s done this before, for Yuuji, and it’s sadly still recent enough in his memory that he hasn’t forgotten anything.

The guy thanks him when he hands over the note, and is about to turn away when he says, “You know, oregano doesn’t go in . . . any potion. You do know this, right?”

Kenma heaves a sigh and pushes at Tooru when he starts laughing. “I know.”

He laughs, then, and it’s the worst sound he’s ever heard, worse than Atsumu’s. A terrible, sharp, cackling laugh. Kenma thinks he’d like to do anything to hear it from him again. “Just checking. Thank you, seriously, for your help. I’ll let you know how it goes!”

Kenma thinks he says something in response, a no problem or a sure thing, but he isn’t really focused enough to know. The customer’s out the door before Kenma can bring himself to forget about his smile.

It is not a crush. Considering Kenma doesn’t even know his name, it’s not a crush. It’s nothing more than curiosity , intrigue, and if he so much hears the word crush again, he’s going to start doling out curses of his own, starting with Tooru.

“You should’ve seen him blush. I didn’t realize he could be so cute.”

“I did not blush,” Kenma snaps, kicking at Tooru’s chair.

He only laughs and moves back, trying to get out of Kenma’s reach. Yaku gives him a sympathetic pat.

“Let him live, Oikawa,” he says. “He didn’t tease you when you were still crushing on Suga.”

“Funny, because if you recall, he did,” Tooru fires back. Kenma fights a smile, because he knows full well that he gave him hell the entire semester he was too scared to actually approach Suga.

The only difference is, Tooru was actually in love with him. Kenma has no interest in this guy, beyond pure curiosity. Intrigue isn’t the same as infatuation, but clearly, no one else seems to get that.

“I think it’s cute that Kenma’s interested in someone,” Shigeru says, chin resting in the palm of his hand. “Maybe dating will get him to finally take a break from working all the time.”

Kenma glares at the lot of them sitting around the table with him. He’d come to enjoy his lunch in peace, and instead, Tooru had to bring up the previous night’s customer. Like he meant anything at all, more than just a break from the stagnancy of a late shift of work. At the very least, he can be grateful Atsumu doesn’t attend the same university, and can’t join them for meals like this just to spew out whatever he wants to about their first meeting. Kenma thinks he might actually cross the line into black magic if that were to ever happen.

“C’mon, c’mon, let him come to terms with his feelings in his own time,” Yaku jokes, giving in to the rest of them.

When Kenma shoves him away, the rest of them only laugh.

“I’m officially curse-free.”

Kenma jolts at the break in the silence, nearly knocking his potions book onto the floor. It’s been a week, a little over, but he’s back. Not that Kenma’s been waiting, but he did say he would return with an update, so he’s been expecting. Just a little bit. A very little bit. Like an afterthought tucked way far into the back of his mind. He just wants to know that his spell still works.

Shigeru gives him a sidelong glance, but says nothing. After a moment, he turns back to the magazine he’s been lazily flipping through for the last hour. Kenma knows he’s still listening.

“Spell worked?” Kenma asks as the guy approaches the counter. The warm aura he always has about him is even warmer now, but in a lighter way. Brighter. It’s less stifling and more comforting.

He nods, an easy smile on his face. “Spell worked. You really are good at those things, huh?”

Kenma averts his gaze, looking back down to his potions book. He hasn’t actually read a single word since he pulled it out. “I guess. Sure.”

“Don’t be, like, bashful about it,” the guy laughs. “It’s cool. You’re smart and that’s cool.”

“Thank you.”

He grins, clearly pleased with himself. “I’m glad you agree. So, uh, hey, I really wanted to, like, do something, just to say thanks for saving my ass.”

“You don’t have to—“

“But I want to!” The guy’s ears are burning red. It’s not cute. “Seriously, you don’t know how much I had to deal with. Daishou already hates me, this was, like, his breaking point, or something.”

“Aren’t bonds with familiars supposed to be trusting and supportive?” Kenma muses, raising an eyebrow. He knows this isn’t always the case, but it’s the first time he’s heard of a relationship that might not have a close bond.

“Yeah, when your familiar respects you,” the guy scoffs. “But, beside the point. Can I just, like, get you dinner or something? I’d offer coffee, but it’s kind of late for that by now.”

Kenma frowns. Maybe it’s a little cute. “I can’t ask you to go out and get me dinner.”

“Good thing I’m offering without you having to, then.” He actually seriously smirks, like he’s so cocky, like he’s taken a page directly out of Atsumu’s handbook.

Not cute. Definitely not cute. “I—“ Kenma huffs. “I don’t even know your name, no.”

He leans forward on the counter, elbows narrowly missing bumping into Kenma’s schoolwork. “I’ll give you my name if you give me an order,” he says. As if he’s not the same guy who was fully flustered with his own words thirty seconds ago.

There’s definitely no way out of this. He wants to do something for Kenma, is going to do something for Kenma, so he sighs, folds his arms, and says, “Okay, sure. Sure. I’ve already had dinner, but if you’re serious, I won’t say no to taiyaki, if you can find some with cheese filling.”

“Cheese taiyaki,” he nods, pushing away from the counter. “I can get some for you, no problem.” He offers one last warm smile, and tells him before walking out the door, “It’s Kuroo, by the way. Nice to meet you.”

Kenma’s eyes linger on the door even after he’s already left, only breaking away when he hears Shigeru snort. He scowls, shifting to face him. “What?”

“Nothing, nothing,” Shigeru says, turning away. He focuses back on his magazine, still looking half amused. Kenma lets it go, and returns to his potions book.

A few minutes of comfortable silence go by. Kenma’s almost totally relaxed and absorbed in trying to comprehend potions for night vision. And then—

“You just wouldn’t have asked for his name if you didn’t plan on seeing him again.”

Kenma picks up the closest pair of highlighters and throws them right at Shigeru, who only laughs when they miss and clatter against the wall. “Shut up! Shut up, nobody asked you.”

“You did, actually, but sure! Go ahead and lie, if that’s what helps you sleep at night.”

There’s no winning tonight. There’s no winning for Kenma, ever, at all. It’s enough to the point where on nights like this, a little piece of him wonders whether he’s ended up cursed without even knowing it. It wouldn’t come as much of a surprise at this point.

He drops his chin into his hand with a huff and flips a page in his book, trying to block Shigeru’s entire existence out. Of course he’s going to have to see Kuroo again. He’s bringing him taiyaki, supposedly, and who knows if he plans to come back into the shop again outside of that. If he does, Kenma at least wants to be able to address him, somehow, even if just in his own head. It feels uncomfortable otherwise.

He flips another page, absorbing absolutely nothing.

Nekomata’s been asking him all week if he even has an inkling as to what he might choose as his devotion.

It’s unfair, Kenma thinks, that he has to decide now what sort of field he wants to spend the rest of his life in. (Yaku always makes a point that there’s no rule saying he can’t return to school later on if he wants to change it, but what’s the point by then? If he makes that type of choice, he should stick with it.) These types of things have weight to them, and despite what his friends like to insist, there is a right and a wrong choice for him.

Like becoming a pastry chef. That’s a wrong choice. Designer, potion maker, convenience store clerk. All wrong. He should be a medic, or work for the ministry offices, or become some sort of police officer. The right choices. The ones that terrify Kenma to his core. The ones that make him feel a little more alone in the world.

Another page. More potions he doesn’t get.

Tooru can go on and on about the future for hours, all the possibilities of things. As if it doesn’t feel like strangling. What’s so fascinating about something so unpredictable? It’s like trying to mix a healing potion. Either the oak root is going to fix someone’s illness, or it’s going to burn a hole through the beaker.

He hates potions. He hates the thought of the future. He hates all these things that are so far out of his control. It makes him feel like he’s going to combust on the spot.

“Can you shut up?” Shigeru cuts through the silence with a pointed look. “You think so loud.” Kenma’s eyes widen. Is he projecting that badly? “Take a break from the potions, dude, it’s clearly not coming to you tonight.”

Kenma gives a light kick to the back of the counter, dropping his gaze. “Sorry. Been a long week.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever,” Shigeru says, not unkindly. “Not your fault. Just, like, you know, it’s like radio static in my head that you keep turning up the volume to. You need a walk? Something to drink? Go, ’s’not like I’m gonna write you up or anything.”

“I’m fine,” Kenma says, waving him off. “I just need a break from studying. I’ll keep it down.”

Shigeru nods and returns to his magazine. It’s a different one from the last time Kenma looked at him. There’s decidedly no work being done by either of them tonight.

Kenma pulls out his phone to play a game instead. Something easy, a good distraction. One that won’t fry his brain trying to work through a level.

He’s only at it for a few minutes when the door jingles open, and Kuroo comes back in, brown paper bag in hand. He hands it over to Kenma with an easy smile.

“For you,” he says. “Thank you, again, seriously. You have . . . no idea how much trouble you saved me from.”

“And seriously,” Kenma says, peering into the bag, “it’s no problem. Spells are the one thing I’m actually good at. I don’t mind.”

“He’s being pissy,” Shigeru cuts in. “He’s good at just about everything. Total smartass.”

Kuroo gives a lilted grin. Fine. It’s cute. He’s cute. It doesn’t mean anything. Shigeru’s cat is cute. Tooru can be cute when he’s not being annoying. So it’s whatever.

“Let me guess,” he says. “Potions are your weak point?”

“Don’t get smart,” Kenma huffs.

Kuroo laughs, terrible, horrible. “I’m not trying to! They can be tough. But I’ve kind of devoted myself to making them for life, y’know. My one specialty.” His ears are tinting red again, and Kenma can feel it sinking in his stomach. He knows what’s coming. He can already hear Tooru’s cackling. “If you want help ever, with, like, whatever, uh. I could give you my number? You could text me whenever?”

There wouldn’t be a point to it, Kenma tells himself. He’s got Shigeru, potions genius, and he probably wouldn’t ever ask Kuroo for help anyway. He never knows how to text someone new, so he just doesn’t. And yet—

“Okay.”

Seeing Kuroo’s face light up and feeling the warmth seeping from him spike is almost worth having to endure Shigeru’s laughter the rest of the night.

It takes one week and four days before Kenma cracks, spends eight minutes composing a message, and sends it to Kuroo asking how the hell poison ivy is meant to be used for healing.

(Kuroo explains things better than Shigeru. There’s no mocking or judgement, and he keeps patient even when Kenma asks close to the same question again and again. It’s easier to ask him some nights than it is to knock on Shigeru’s bedroom door.)

(He doesn’t tell a soul he’s talking to him, but from the looks Shigeru sometimes sends him, he thinks he probably knows.)

Shigeru is the worst roommate on the entire face of the earth, actually. Moving in together when they first decided on it seemed like a good plan; they generally get along well, they both have the same standards for cleanliness, Kenma likes Shigeru’s cat who likes him just as well back. They both understand the need for personal space, but can also sit comfortably together, and all in all, it seemed like a good idea. And it was, really, Kenma likes living with Shigeru.

It’s just that he’s a complete and utter traitor who lets Yaku in at eight in the morning to force him to go to his advising appointment.

“Nekomata doesn’t even care if I go,” Kenma mutters, glaring at the sidewalk as Yaku pulls him along by his hand.

“But I’m sure he’s still got hope,” he says. “You really wanna crush the poor man’s soul like that?”

“This meeting is going to crush my soul.”

Yaku rolls his eyes and gives Kenma’s hand a squeeze. “You’re so overdramatic. It’s not like you could put this off forever anyway. You have to have something to tell him by the end of the semester. I’ll treat you to the bakery after.”

Kenma slides his gaze over to him. “Promise?”

His lips twitch, barely concealing a smile. “Promise.”

University wasn’t a scary thing to start with. Kenma would go so far as to say he was excited about the prospect of it when he started taking entrance exams and filling out application forms. There was so much to learn about the world, about magic, about the ways magic worked in the world, and he practically itched for all the learning. Not to mention, the challenge of it.

He’s always had an easy time grasping nearly everything about magic, but university would hopefully present something to actually make his mind work in ways nothing else truly had before. He was excited to have new obstacles to overcome, new puzzles to solve.

But there was still the issue of having to devote himself to something. He’s avoided it a full year and a half, as long as absolutely possible. It’s hard to decide on something to spend the rest of his life doing when it means giving up everything else. Hard to decide on something when what he wants is so far different from what everyone else expects when presented with his skills, his grades, his mindset. He should do something heroic, like all the video game protagonists he grew up with. He doesn’t really know what he wants yet, but it’s not that. It’s not.

He feels guilty to admit it, but it’s the truth. He doesn’t think he’s cut out for saving people like that.

Nekomata needs an answer, though. Something he can enter into the form and send off to the university head so that Kenma can continue on with his education.

“I’ll wait for you outside, alright?” Yaku says as they walk up to Nekomata’s office. “You don’t even have to make a decision today, you know? Just give him something he can work with to start narrowing fields for you. Let him feel like he’s helping, even if you decide to change your mind entirely on your decision day.”

“I know,” Kenma says. His hands twitch.

Nekomata stresses him the hell out. He likes him, seriously. It’s just that he always feels like he’s disappointing him by not knowing.

He offers a gentle smile when Kenma steps into his office, and offers him a seat. Kenma sits at the very edge of it, ready to bolt as soon as this is over with.

Over the course of the last couple years, Kenma’s met with Nekomata plenty. Outside of being his advisor, he’s taught a couple of his classes, and offered him a TA position he didn’t end up taking out of schedule conflicts. He asks Kenma about his classes, his job, how his games have been going, and fills him in about what’s gone on in the courses he’s teaching this semester. It’s comfortable, and Kenma almost lets himself forget what he came in for to begin with.

“You don’t have to make any final decisions today,” Nekomata says, “but have you thought at all about what field you’d like to declare yourself to? I can start gathering information for you about the courses and field work opportunities for next time.”

Kenma shifts in his seat. “Um.” He can always change his mind and he knows it. There’s still another month and a half before he has to give his final, official answer. But even trying to answer this has his stomach in knots. “I don’t know. Maybe . . . ethics and law? Medical studies?” Maybe he should drop out, or transfer to a regular university. He could study something outside of magic. It wouldn’t make him as happy, or be as useful, but it would sure as hell be easier.

Nekomata frowns. It’s just a slight thing, but enough that Kenma feels it. “I distinctly remember you telling me you don’t like either of those things.” Kenma shrugs. “Listen. Take the next couple weeks to think about it. Do a little exploring, a little experimenting. Look around. Take some time, figure out what you want.” He offers a reassuring smile, as if it will really do anything to make him feel better.

What he wants. What does he want?

To make other people happy.

To make myself happy.

Conflicting goals.

He makes Yaku buy him a full bag of mochi ice cream and dorayaki on the way back. It does nothing to make him feel better.

On a Sunday afternoon, Kenma knows the university campus won’t be totally vacant, but he’s expecting peace. No one he knows would come in this far into the weekend, not even Tooru. So he kind of figures the chances of being interrupted are low, and he’ll be able to focus entirely on experimenting in one of the labs. He just wants a few hours to himself to think in a way he can’t around any of his friends. He doesn’t want to disappoint Nekomata, or anyone else, when it comes time to make his choice.

He doesn’t want to regret anything.

There’s an empty lab that doesn’t hold any classes anymore, tucked down a side hallway just past the study area Yaku always hangs around. It’s been Kenma’s go-to workspace for the last couple semesters, since Tooru pointed it out to him. It was riddled with spiders and a small collection of other bugs Kenma didn’t even want to try to identify, and it took a while to actually clean the whole space up enough that he could be comfortable, but it’s his space now.

He pulls a stool up to one of the counters, pulls out his notebooks, and—

Nothing.

He’s got nothing.

Kenma slumps in his seat, dropping his chin into his hand. He doesn’t really even know what Nekomata meant. Experiment, explore. All he can do is flip through his notes, look through all the doodles and scribbled spells and okonomiyaki recipes, and let the pressure sink in. He knows what he likes and what he doesn’t like, but it’s the third category that he can’t seem to place: things he wouldn’t mind spending his whole life doing. That’s a limited selection, and sometimes, he thinks it might be a blank page.

There’s a section of pages in his potions notebook filled with nothing but doodles of imaginary potion bottles. They’re more likely to be found on a video game screen than anywhere in reality, and take the place of information Kenma probably could have used on his last exam, but he likes the designs. They’re more interesting than the standard bottles found on drug store shelves.

He waves a lazy hand over the notebook to turn the page. Maybe he should take up glass blowing. There could be something to gain from making magic look more magical.

There’s a tentative knock on the open lab door, and Kenma starts, his notebook flying shut. A familiar head of messy hair sticks into the room, paired with a sheepish smile.

“Kuroo?”

“Hi, sorry.” Kuroo lingers in the doorway, clearly unsure as to whether or not he’s welcome to actually come inside. “I was passing down through this way and saw you here — I just wanted to say hey.”

Kenma feels himself smiling. “Hey.”

“I hope I’m not interrupting anything, sorry.”

The temperature in the room is growing gradually warmer, Kenma starts to notice. He wonders if Kuroo’s even aware of it.

“No, it’s fine,” he says. “I’m not really getting much done here anyway. You can come in, if you want.”

“You sure?”

Kenma gives him a flat look. “Kuroo, seriously, I’m not gonna bite. Or curse you, or whatever.”

Kuroo snorts a laugh and the temperature returns to normal. His ears are red. “If you insist.” He pulls his own stool over to the counter across from Kenma, dropping his backpack onto the floor beside him. “Can I ask what you’re doing here this late on a weekend?”

“Can I ask you?” Kenma counters. There’s a beat, and Kenma offers a smile to match Kuroo’s before dropping his gaze to all his notebooks. “I don’t know. I came in to think, or mess around, or something. I’ve kinda been . . . trying to figure out what I like, I guess.”

“Ah, you’ve gotta make your declaration soon, huh?” Kuroo asks. Kenma nods. “Kinda sucks that you’ve gotta make such a huge decision so early in life. I mean, like, I’ve known for a while, if I wanted to keep on with magic professionally, it’d be in potions, you know? But I know not everyone really knows like that. I think you’ve gotta be really lucky to have it all figured out.”

“Then I must be the unluckiest person on the planet,” Kenma sighs. He catches himself then, eyes darting back up to Kuroo. “Sorry, I’m not trying to throw some kind of pity party, or anything. It’s stupid.”

“It’s not stupid.” Kuroo gives him a steady look, eyes searching. Kenma has to keep from folding in on himself the way he wants, to try and avoid Kuroo finding anything. “Have you actually gone and visited anywhere to get actual experience with things? Workshops or anything?”

“Mm, a few. I’ve still got a few weeks to search around some anyway, so.” He shrugs. “I’ll figure it out.” He’s clearly brushing off the subject, but Kuroo doesn’t try to stop him. There’s a deeper current here, and he seems to know it’s not his place to step in. “What’re you doing around here, though? You never answered.”

Kuroo’s smile sharpens. “You wanna see?”

He waits for Kenma to tuck all his work back into his bag before leading him down the hall to another, smaller room. There’s some actual lab equipment spread across some of the counter space, and it smells strongly of raspberry. The warmth is what catches him, though. This is clearly Kuroo’s space.

“Here, here, you can sit,” Kuroo says, hands grazing a chair as he passes by it to get to the cabinets at the back. He glances over his shoulder at Kenma, a light in his eye. “I promise, it’s cool.”

Kenma settles into his seat as he watches Kuroo flit about and fiddle with tools and ingredients he can barely name. Sometimes, Kuroo will ramble on for paragraphs when he texts him about chemistry and the science behind magic and potions. Kenma can’t follow half of it most of the time, but it’s sweet. He’s passionate. That’s sweet.

He’s more timid in person, but when it comes down to it, Kuroo’s excited about what seems like everything. Kenma might love magic but Kuroo loves it. Would probably properly court it and write it poems and embrace it warm under the moonlight given the chance. He mumbles to himself as he assembles his setup, and Kenma watches with the smallest smile on his face. He’s so lame. The lamest in the world.

“I’ve been working on this since, like, last year, probably,” Kuroo tells him. “I’m gonna submit it as one of my final projects for the semester. You should see the mess I’ve made with this at my apartment. It’s been a process. But I’ve got it now, I think. I hope. Otherwise I’m about to totally embarrass myself.” He lifts his head to give Kenma a bright, laughing smile, and Kenma can feel the warmth in his toes.

“I think I’d like to see that,” Kenma tells him.

Kuroo lets out a disbelieving laugh. “Really. And here I was thinking you were so nice and soft-spoken, but you just want me to make an ass of myself, huh?”

“I’m nice,” Kenma says.

“Right.”

“I just like some entertainment.”

“Then I guess I’m here to provide.”

Kenma bites his lip and looks away, trying to find anything else in the room to focus on. He can’t grasp how Kuroo can be so awkward one minute and so sure of everything about himself the next.

“Okay, okay, I’ve got it.” Kuroo has a rounded flask half-filled with a mixture of all sorts of chemicals Kenma can’t place the names to, a dish of red powder, and a beaker of water ready to go. Everything scattered about looks almost professional, like in a few years, he really will be ready to work in his own little potions shop. Somewhere in the heart of the city, where the foot traffic can’t help but flow into.

“Ready?”

“For you to make a fool of yourself?”

“I appreciate the vote of confidence.” Kuroo’s whole face is lit up, and the warmth of the room wraps around Kenma like Tooru’s softest blanket. “Watch, watch.”

Kuroo tips the powder into the flask first, then immediately follows it up with water before putting a cork in to close the opening. He gives it a gentle shake to mix it, eyes focused intently on the fizzling reaction. Kenma watches with bated breath, waiting to see what brilliant scheme has him this excited.

Slowly, ever so-slightly, the potion warms into a soft glow, the red of the powder mixing and fading into a pale white-pink. An excited smile curls at Kuroo’s lips and his eyes flash up to Kenma.

“Protection, from— Okay, this sounds sorta lame as I say it, but protection from evil,” he says, voice hushed and gentle. “It’s just meant to be a temporary thing, but it’ll protect from black magic and demons and the like for a little while.”

Kenma’s gaze transfixes on the potion, still glowing with the subtlest light. His voice comes out barely above a whisper. “That’s incredible.”

This. This must be what it’s like to know. The passion lit like a flame, the excitement vibrating from his very core. For Kenma, it’s a distant dream, but Kuroo holds it in the palm of his hand. Belonging.

Kenma slowly looks up at Kuroo and meets his eye. “You’re incredible.”

Kuroo beams.

Incredible.

“You’re back late,” Yaku comments, sprawled across the living room couch. Kenma doesn’t even bother asking what he’s doing in his apartment. “Were you seriously working that long?”

Kenma sinks onto the floor beside him, leaning his head back against Yaku’s shoulder. “Not really. I mean, I was there, but I wasn’t really . . . I ran into Kuroo.”

“Oh?”

Kenma rolls his eyes, already knowing where this is going. “It was nothing. He happened to pass by my room and stopped in to say hello.”

“You did more than just exchange greetings,” Yaku says. He shifts to sit up, leaning halfway sideways to actually look at Kenma. “Were you with him this whole time?”

He could lie. Yaku might catch onto it, but he’s not one to pry where Kenma clearly doesn’t want him. But it’d be a waste anyway, he already knows. Plus, he can’t really bring himself to lie to Yaku. “Yes. He— Don’t give me that look. He was just going to show me this potion he’s been working on, but he ended up showing me more after that. He taught me some things about the chemistry behind it all, and went to pick up something to eat on our way out. It’s not really a big deal.”

“Mm, sure. I just think it’s cute you’re still talking to him.”

“It was chance.”

Yaku reaches over to ruffle his hair. “Still cute. You’re looking like you’re gonna live out your cheesy rom-com dreams.”

Kenma wrinkles his nose. Who does he think he is, actually? “Don’t be gross.”

“How am I being gross? You’re the one who’s made me sit through Our Meal for Tomorrow at least four times now. You have two DVDs of Love Actually!”

Kenma spins around to face him, eyes narrowed. “Because they’re quality films, and if you’re going to act like they’re anything other, you can go ahead and leave.”

Yaku tips his head back with a laugh. “That’s not what I’m saying and you know it! I’m just saying, you’re a romantic, Kenma.”

“Whatever. I don’t even like Kuroo like that.”

“Right.”

“I’m serious.”

“Right.”

Kuroo sometimes texts him at three in the morning with photos from the school lab and captions Kenma can’t comprehend that late into the night. They’re riddled with exclamation points. It’s sort of endearing.

Hey are you on campus today?

yeah whats up

Coffee? There’s a little place down the street I think you’d like!

okay

Okay!

Kuroo brings him to Suga’s parents’ café, because of course he does. It’s on par with Kenma’s luck, and so is the fact that Suga’s working that afternoon, and, well, he does like it. It’s cozy and all the dishware is mismatched and there are little crystals and charms decorating the whole place. It feels like magic. Kuroo flashes a grin at him as they walk in. Magic.

“Kenma-kun! H—Oh! And Tetsu!” Kenma sighs and closes his eyes, already knowing both Suga and Kuroo are looking at him. “I didn’t know you two had met!”

“Ah, yeah, kind of by chance,” Kuroo says. “He helped me with Daishou.”

“So I have Kenma to thank for your place being quiet again,” Suga says, smile growing wide. “Tetsu’s my neighbor, you know, and all the shit Daishou was giving him hit me, too.”

Kenma nods, the puzzle pieces slowly aligning themselves in his head. “Tooru mentioned that.”

“Of course.” Suga laughs, loud enough to overpower the old jazz playing over the radio and all the chatter from the other customers seated around. Suga’s a loud person, vibrant. Kenma likes him. “Can I just assume you both want your usual?”

Kenma and Kuroo both nod, and Suga waves them off to an empty booth tucked in the corner to sit and wait. Kenma tucks his feet under him, getting perfectly comfortable. He already knows Suga is texting Tooru about everything, and they’ll both start to connect the dots. He’ll never hear the end of anything, but he can’t really bring himself to mind.

“I didn’t realize you knew Suga-chan,” Kuroo says, hands fiddling with the dish of sugar packets in the middle of the table.

“He’s dating one of my friends,” Kenma tells him. “So we’re kind of friends.”

Kuroo nods. “I feel a lot less brilliant bringing you here now if you already know about it”, he admits, a joking lilt to his voice. “I thought I was going to be showing you something special.”

Kenma gives him a smile. “It’s still special. And you were right, that I’d like it, because I do. So.”

This makes Kuroo smile, tints his cheeks with blush. It’s a little cute that he definitely can’t conceal his feelings to save his life. There’s another part of this that’s intimidating, when Kenma still can’t figure out what he’s feeling. But it’s not so bad in the scheme of things, he figures. This is the one thing he might actually have time to really consider.

“You caused Suga-san a lot of trouble, huh?”

Kuroo cries out and covers his face with his hands, ears turning even redder. Kenma can’t help but laugh. “I swear he’s never going to let it go! I know it got bad, but I was doing my best! I went through and cleaned everything in his apartment that ended up affected. It took so much research for spells I didn’t know existed.”

“You should’ve found me sooner,” Kenma says. “I could’ve helped.”

“Next time I’m cursed and ruining Suga-chan’s life, you’ll be the first person I call.”

“Next time. I don’t like the sound of that, Tetsu.” Suga sets two steaming mugs down on the table, sliding them towards Kenma and Kuroo. “I don’t think I could handle having my apartment flooded twice.” Kenma snorts as Kuroo heaves a sigh, hanging his head in shame. “Although, if Kenma’s helping, I imagine the damage would be far less. He’s the most talented person I know, even if he only ever uses his skill to cheat at card games.”

“That’s not true,” Kenma protests.

“Right, right, you also use it to terrorize Tooru.”

Kenma smiles and gives a solid nod. “Right.”

Kuroo lets out a sharp laugh at that. “You’re really interesting, you know?”

Suga’s eyes flicker between the two of them, clearly considering something Kenma needs no commentary on. “I’ll just leave you two. Let me know if you want refills, yeah?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Kenma says, waving him off.

They spend longer in the café than Kenma ever thought they would. It’s easy to talk to Kuroo, and even easier to lose himself in it. He’s interesting, funny, not pushy like the rest of his friends are. Completely awkward, but in the most endearing way. It’s sweet, he’s sweet. He rambles on about potions and professional volleyball teams and listens to Kenma talk about video games. It’s just as comfortable as talking to Yaku or Tooru, which means something, probably, he knows, but he’s not ready to dwell on that just yet. He’s not ready to jump in any deeper.

By the time they leave, the sun’s already starting to go down.

“Are you okay to get back on your own?” Kuroo asks, lingering at the bus stop.

“I’ll be fine,” Kenma promises. “You be careful getting home, too.”

“It’s a block away, I’ll be alright. Just . . . Text me, when you make it home?”

Kenma bites back a smile. “I will.”

Kuroo nods, and only lingers for another moment before heading back his own way.

He’s barely gotten off the bus at his own stop when Tooru’s calling him. Figures. Suga’s probably told him everything. He wasn’t even the slightest bit subtle watching them all afternoon from behind the counter.

“Tooru.”

“How was your date?” He doesn’t even need to see Tooru to see the shit-eating grin on his face. Kenma scrunches his nose. Despicable.

“It wasn’t a date,” he says.

“Kou-chan thinks you were on a date. It certainly looked like one. You were there all afternoon.” He pauses. “He said you looked happy.”

Kenma scoffs. “What of it? I’m happy a lot of the time. Any time I’m not around you, actually.”

“Rude! And you so know it’s not like that.”

He does. He knows there’s something about Kuroo that sticks. He knows he’s getting himself into something with this.

“We were just talking,” Kenma tells him. “He was just going to work on some homework and thought he’d ask me along.”

“Kou-chan mentioned nothing about you two actually working.”

“I said he was going to work. Neither of us really . . . got around to any of that.”

Tooru laughs, even as he tries to cover it up. “And you’re still going to tell me it wasn’t a date. Okay, Neko-chan. You just sat and chatted for hours over coffee, he made you laugh, but it’s not a date. Alright.”

“It’s not.”

“I said alright!”

“And you didn’t mean it.”

“Can you blame me? You like him.”

“I do not—“

“You like him. But it’s okay if you don’t want to do anything about it right now.” Tooru’s voice softens. A gentle reminder that he’s not always such a shithead. “You can take your time with it, no pressure. I know you’ve got a lot else on your plate. D’you still wanna talk about it?”

Kenma drops his gaze to the pavement, shoe scuffing on the sidewalk as he kicks a stray rock along. “I don’t know. Maybe. He’s kind of . . . He told me to text him when I get home.”

“Cute.”

“Yeah.” There’s a pause. Kenma turns the afternoon’s conversation over in his mind. “I don’t want to, I don’t know, rush into anything, I guess. It was nice, he’s really nice, I just still don’t really know how I feel. I like him, but I don’t know if I like him enough like that.”

“I know what you mean,” Tooru says. “Take your time, Neko-chan. No one’s rushing you into anything.”

It’s not entirely true, but hearing it still comforts him. At the very least, he knows there’s no pressure here. The one aspect of his life he doesn’t have to truly stress over for the moment.

“I’m back at my building,” Kenma says, deciding this is as far as he wants to take this conversation. “I’ll call you later, okay?”

“Sure, sure. Make sure you have dinner. Kou-chan said you had, like, half a muffin while you were there.”

“I’ll make dinner,” Kenma promises. “I’ll talk to you later, Tooru.”

“Bye bye, Neko-chan.”

On the elevator up to his floor, Kenma sends off a quick text to Kuroo to let him know he made it back.

Most days, Kenma spends his mornings and the time between classes with Yaku and Shigeru, studying and messing around and trying to beat the next level of hocus without tearing all their hair out. Nights are for working late shifts alongside Atsumu, or with visits from Tooru. But afternoons fit a new piece into the routine. Kuroo swings into Kenma’s empty lab room to work on assignments, and they play Pokemon Go walking to Kenma’s bus stop, and sometimes they duck into Suga’s for a snack.

It’s comfortable. Kuroo talks about the best chigenabe he’s ever had and asks Kenma about the spell he’s been working on with Shigeru for a shared class. He calls Kenma pretty one evening when they’re tucked into the corner booth at Suga’s family’s place and Kenma’s mind short-circuits.

“You’re totally smitten,” Tooru comments casually as he flips through a magazine at the convenience store counter. “It’s cute.”

“I’m not smitten— Shut up, Tooru.”

He’s kind of, maybe. Just a little bit.

He has four emails from Nekomata asking to schedule a final check-in meeting. One of them blatantly calls him out for avoiding him, which helps nothing at all. The semester is coming quickly to a close and it feels like it’s suffocating him. He still has no idea.

One evening, between games of Hangman, Tooru helped him construct a list of likes and dislikes, to try and help narrow things down. It kind of did, except not really, because there wasn’t a middle section for indifference, which is how Kenma thinks he feels about a lot of things. He doesn’t hate the idea of some things, like clerical work for the ministry office, or legal practice, but he’s not all that passionate about them, either. And the things he is aren’t practical, or particularly useful to society, or just purely don’t have a career to line up with.

At the very least, he knows he’s not going to go into anything with potions or medicine. He won’t be an officer of any sort, if for nothing more than the fact that “there’s no way you’d pass the physical exam.”

The rest is a total grey area.

He finds himself tucked in the very back corner of his lab room, list laid out in the middle of a scattering of print-outs of all his research on potential careers. He thinks he might just give in and drop out. He thinks he might cry. A lot.

Kenma pushes all the papers back, clearing the space in front of him, and pulls his phone out from the depths of his backpack. At the very least, he’ll reply to Nekomata. Even if he has no idea what to say or what he wants. He doesn’t really know anything, but it’s not like he’s getting any closer to figuring it out. But at least if he talks to Nekomata, they can sort something out. Even if it means deferring for a year, like Tooru. Even if it means losing out on endless opportunities he might never get back, like Tooru.

He’s definitely going to cry.

Before he can go back on it, he types and sends an email to Nekomata. He brings up the last couple possible dates for advising, but he still gets it done, which counts. He’s at least got it done. Even if it feels like there’s more pressure on his shoulders than before.

He buries his face in his hands, breathing deep. Everything is a mess.

Minutes go by without him being able to bring himself to move. He’s supposed to fine-tune his and Shirabu’s spell and read more about potential careers within the ministry, but thinking about that makes his head hurt.

Slowly, so subtle he almost misses it, a warmth blankets over him. Comforting and familiar.

“Hi, Kuroo,” he mutters into his hands. This is quite possibly the worst position for him to find Kenma in, but it’s not like he can take it back.

There’s a sharp spike of heat. Kuroo startling. “I— Sorry, I didn’t mean to intrude on anything.” Kenma peeks through the gaps in his fingers to see Kuroo standing awkwardly in the doorway. “Just . . . are you okay?”

Kenma breathes a humorless laugh. “I’m stressed,” he admits. “You can come sit, if you want. I don’t mind. I’m not getting much done here anyway.”

Kuroo tentatively steps into the room and pulls a stool up across from Kenma. “How’d you know I was even here? I didn’t think you were really looking.”

Kenma spreads his fingers wider. “You’re like a furnace, Kuroo. It’s kind of impossible not to know when you’re around when you go around warming everything up like that.”

“Oh. I didn’t even realize—“ Kuroo laughs, airy and light. Still a tinge of nervousness. “Do I really do that?”

“No one’s ever told you?” Kenma asks. Everyone has something. Some are more subtle than others. Tooru’s easy to miss, and Kenma probably would if he weren’t so familiar with him now. Like slowly sinking into a pool of water, calming. Kenma himself knows he’s like static white noise, from how much Shigeru whines about it. And just like Suga, Kuroo brings in warmth.

“No, I mean, they have, I just didn’t realize it was so obvious,” he says.

“Mm, I’m just better at picking things up. It’s nice, though. You’re warm and it’s nice.”

Kuroo flushes red, a smile slowly creeping across his face. “Right. I— Right. Um, thank you.” Kenma offers the nicest smile he can. He is cute. He’s cute and sweet and warm and in this particular moment, like this, Kenma thinks he really could maybe possibly kiss him. Truly. “Can I . . . ask, what’s got you so stressed?”

“Ah, yeah, it’s, you know. I have to make a decision, about what sort of field to devote myself to. And I don’t know.”

Kuroo hums, scanning all the papers strewn about. He picks up Kenma’s list of likes and dislikes, scrawled out in Tooru’s neat handwriting. “This seems like a start, yeah? Charms, culinary magic, education — those are all cool. And, I mean, you. You talk about different kinds of taiyaki, like, all the time.”

“But those aren’t useful,” Kenma says, voice coming out sharper than he intended. He drops his gaze to the countertop, hands wringing in his lap. “It’d be a waste. People talk, you know, all the time about all this talent, and talented people go into things like medicine or law or development, doing things to actually help people. I’m not supposed to just . . . throw this away on something insignificant. I should be doing something useful.”

Kuroo gives him a steady, even stare. No judgement, no pushing. Just easy. “But about what you want? Not what everyone else expects. What do you want?”

He can barely find his voice. His whole chest feels tight. “What’s it matter what I want?”

“Kenma.” Kuroo tips his chin up with gentle fingers, making him meet his eyes. “You don’t have to sacrifice your own happiness to please anyone else. There are plenty of other people in the world with the ability to save it. There are other healers and officers and scientists, who are all perfectly content with what they’re doing. They won’t miss you if you don’t join them in their work. You should do what’s going to make you happy. You’ll still be the best in your field. You’ll still be doing something for someone. Maybe you protect a kid’s building from demons. Maybe you serve him charmed mochi. Either way, you’re doing him a service that brings him some kind of joy, aren’t you?”

Kenma chews on his lip and gives a silent nod.

“The world’s not just science and law. People need people making sweets and developing games and teaching them spells to take care of their asshole familiars to make it a place worth living in. The things you like aren’t useless.”

The pressure starts to lift as warmth creeps into his bones.

“I think you could make some really kickass, life-saving taiyaki.”

At this, Kenma finally smiles, and Kuroo matches it.

yaku-san

can you tell me about studying cross-uni

I’ll call you!

Kenma sends three more emails to Nekomata, spends four hours reading through different articles, and feels lighter than he has in months. He texts Kuroo after his final class on Friday, to ask if he’s free, and gets a response that he’s working in one of the labs but Kenma’s welcome to join if he’d like.

Kuroo’s focused intently on some mixture in a beaker on the counter in front of him, and startles when Kenma’s footsteps break through his silence. He breaks into a smile when he realizes who it is.

“Not busy?” he asks.

Kenma shakes his head. “I’ve allotted some time for myself today.”

“And what’s that supposed to mean?” Kuroo laughs.

He gives Kuroo a level look, feeling his face warm at his own words before he even speaks. “It means I get a break from all the stuff that’s stressing me out to do some things I’d like to.”

Kuroo lights up. “And you decided you’d spend time with me?” There’s a playful, teasing lilt to his voice. He completely already knows.

“You know I like you,” Kenma huffs. “I like spending time with you.”

“God, I’m smitten.”

“I know.”

Kuroo tips his head back with a disbelieving laugh, and Kenma smiles. He feels like he can breathe, fully and completely.

“What’re you working on?” Kenma asks, pulling his seat up next to Kuroo’s and peering into his beaker.

“It’s a general potion for healing,” Kuroo tells him. “I think I’ve shown you the chemical formula for it before. I’m trying to make some adjustments to make it a little stronger without causing any negative side effects. It’s trickier than it sounds.”

Kenma scrunches his nose. “How do you even know how to do this?”

“How do you know how to come up with a spell on the fly to get your coffee to heat faster when we’re at Suga’s?” Kuroo counters. “It’s just practice and far too many hours spent studying. You know.”

“But potions suck.”

“You suck!”

Kenma snorts and bumps his shoulder into Kuroo’s. It’s nice like this. Kuroo’s just—

Nice.

“You’re in a good mood,” Kuroo notes. “I don’t think I’ve seen so much of this side of you.”

“Like I said, I’m doing things I like for the afternoon. Of course I’m in a good mood.”

“Ah, so because you’re with me, then? I see.”

Kenma doesn’t even try to refute it. He only nods, biting back a grin when he sees Kuroo flush red.

“Careful, I might start to think you actually like me.”

“That’s the point, isn’t it?”

The teasing air falls away, and Kenma’s words hang in the empty space. He knows there’s a weight to what he’s said, but he also knows Kuroo’s spent the last several weeks casually flirting through all their conversations and getting flustered every time Kenma so much as accidentally brushes against his hand. Has he seriously missed that his feelings are decidedly fully mutual?

Kuroo turns to properly look at Kenma, far closer than Kenma originally thought they were. “You . . .”

“Come on, Kuroo,” Kenma says softly, rolling his eyes. “I, y’know, like you. I really . . . really like you.”

“You really mean it?” For half a breath, Kenma sees Kuroo’s eyes flicker down to his lips before looking up again. The heat in the room is borderline stifling.

“You’re really stupid or something, huh?”

Kuroo breathes a laugh, shifting impossibly closer.

“Definitely stupid.”

“I know.”

“Is this— Is this flirting? Because if so, it’s really awful flirting.”

“Mm.” Kenma lifts a careful hand to Kuroo’s face, fingers just barely ghosting against his skin, waiting for the okay. Kuroo leans into it, lips parting, and Kenma tips forward.

Kissing Kuroo is as comfortable as everything else about him. Warm and steady and nice. He brings a hand to Kenma’s waist and it feels like it’s going to burn right through his sweater. He feels light.

Text me when you get home!

yeah ok dad

I just want to know you’re safe!

i’m at my building

Thank you

pushing the button on the elevator

getting onto the elevator

pressing the button for my floor

Kenmaaa

yeah

i’m home. i’ll see you tomorrow?

Tomorrow (:

“I knew you were in love with him,” Tooru says, forgoing a hello entirely as he strides into the convenience store. He goes around the counter and pulls up the empty stool beside Kenma, dropping into it like he belongs there.

“You know, only employees are actually allowed back here,” Kenma tells him, not sparing him a glance.

“And I had to hear it from Yahaba-kun of all people. I can’t believe you told him you and Kuroo made out before telling me.”

Kenma finally looks up from the game on his phone to give Tooru a flat stare. “First of all, we did not make out. I kissed him, there’s a difference. Secondly, why would I tell you?”

“I told you when Kou-chan and I got together.”

“And I didn’t ask for any one of those details,” Kenma says. “And I’m not in love with Kuroo, but thanks. Is this all you came here for? Because if you’re not going to buy anything, you can leave. No loitering. There’s a sign in the window. I know you can read.”

Tooru, entirely unsurprisingly, ignores everything. “And what do you mean you kissed him? You made the move, Neko-chan? I have to say I didn’t see that coming, but—“

Kenma mutters a spell under his breath and Tooru goes completely silent, even as his mouth continues to move and his hands gesture wildly around him. It takes a moment for him to catch on, and when he does, Kenma thinks it’s probably worth it when he completely tackles him straight to the ground.

Yaku finds them still wrestling each other when he comes in a few minutes later, backpack slung over one shoulder. He takes one look at the pair of them and sighs.

“Oikawa, when I said I was coming to work with Kenma, that wasn’t an open invitation for you to join us.”

Tooru, still without a voice, only makes a face and sticks out his tongue.

“It’s fine, it’s whatever,” Kenma says, brushing it off. “Shigeru told him about Kuroo and now he’s all worked up — but I know he’s not going to interrupt such an important discussion just to have me tell him how nice it was or that I’m seeing him again tomorrow.”

Tooru sends him a snotty grin, chin tilted up like he’s won something, even when he can’t do so much as make a sound.

Yaku snorts and settles onto Tooru’s vacant stool. “You’re both dumb. I brought some information about different programs and universities,” he says, lifting his backpack onto the counter. “There’s a few I think would be good for you, but I can’t help much more until you know for sure what you want to do.” He pulls out a thin stack of papers and passes them to Kenma. Tooru peers over his shoulder as he flips through them. “Atsumu would probably be a good person to ask, too, if you want someone else with actual experience.”

“Don’t be gross,” Kenma says. Even if Yaku’s right, he has no desire to ask Atsumu of all people for help or information about his program of study. He scans some of the pages, taking in some of the cursory information. “You think this’ll be a good idea?”

“Kenma, I know whatever you decide to do is going to be a perfectly good plan. You’re going to do something great.”

Kenma nods, not lifting his eyes from the pages. The pressure eases just a little bit more as he continues looking through all of Yaku’s research. This is something to actually work with. This is something he can really do.

“What were you thinking about, when you brought this up?” Yaku asks after a moment.

A smile pulls at Kenma’s lips. “Suga-san’s flooded apartment.”

For the first time, Kenma visits Nekomata’s office without wanting to turn right back around and leave, and has a full, honest conversation without hesitating over his words. It’s the longest he’s ever been in there, with all the time he spends pulling up information and applications on his computer, and the best Kenma’s ever felt about leaving.

Kuroo meets him outside with a warm cup of coffee and a light kiss to his cheek. “How’d it go?”

“Good. Really good. I think I really know what I’m doing,” he says. “And I think Nekomata’s proud of me.”

“Of course he is. I think you’re going to do something incredible.” Kuroo slips his hand into Kenma’s as they walk, smooth and easy. “You’re the most brilliant magician who ever lived.”

Kenma rolls his eyes and bumps Kuroo’s shoulder. “Shut up. It’s not that special.”

“It is, and so are you.” Kuroo grins down at him, so warm that Kenma can’t bring himself to argue. “What’re you thinking about doing?”

Kenma tells him about the different cross-university programs, where he can learn things both in and outside the field of magic. The one he’s most considering, tragically, involves attending in part Atsumu’s university, which might actually convince him to change his mind and go into law instead. It makes Kuroo laugh, at least.

But what he really cares about, Kenma tells him as they get up to his apartment, is the concept of the game. It still needs a lot of work and concept development, but it could really be something. A piece of software that’s as much a game as it is educational on teaching actual spells and potions and concepts in magic. Something to make it easier to remember the tricker ins and outs of things, with actual decent representations of things and way cooler bottles for potions.

“Brilliant,” Kuroo says, draping his arms over Kenma’s shoulders. “You’re brilliant.” He ducks his head down to kiss him, and Kenma smiles into it.

“Mm, shut up about it.”

“Make me.”

Like pieces of a puzzle, Kenma thinks, things are finally actually fitting together. As Kuroo pulls him closer, and as Shigeru slams the front door and shouts about the kitchen being a shared space, and Kuroo laughs against him, Kenma thinks things are finally sliding into place, and he can breathe.